Partnership help for young mothers and their babies

The Family Nurse Partnership (FNP), which is being piloted in the south Bradford area with first-time mothers aged 19 and under, aims to improve the health and wellbeing of the most disadvantaged children and families by focusing on the baby's future life.

A team of nurses from Bradford and Airedale Community Health Service started the local FNP earlier this year and are seeing 60 young women regularly throughout their pregnancy, birth and up to their toddler's second birthday.

Everyone taking part has a named nurse for the whole time they are involved in the FNP.

The nurse aims to see each woman up to 14 times during their pregnancy, then weekly when the baby is born, moving to fortnightly up to 18 months old and then monthly to their second birthday.

The nurses work through a structured programme with the women which focuses on six areas: personal health; environmental health; life course development; maternal role; family and friends; and health and human services.

Alex Horsfall, family nurse supervisor for the project, said: "We work very closely with the mums to build on their strengths and encourage them to fulfil their aspirations for their baby and themselves.

"It's great that we've had so many women joining the programme and so far the results are really encouraging. We've seen mums stop smoking, improve their confidence and self-esteem, think about going back to education or training in the future, and start to build better relationships with their families so they have more support and a stable home life for their baby."